Family

Do emojis damage confidence in teen girls?

Family

Do emojis damage confidence in teen girls?

Take a scroll through the emojis on your phone. You'll find manicured nails, a bride, a princess, a dancing woman, Playboy bunnies and various girls in pink. They don't play sports or have careers. According to Always, these tiny images that teen girls send to each other every day (to the tune of one billion daily emojis) subtly reinforce female stereotypes.

“Of course, societal limitations are broader than just emojis," says Michele Baeten, the lead on Always' #LikeAGirl campaign at Procter & Gamble. "But when we realized that stereotypical, limiting messages are hiding in places as innocent as emojis, it motivated us to demand change.”

In a recent survey, Always discovered that 82 percent of girls ages 16 to 24 use emojis on a daily basis and 67 percent believe that the available female emojis imply that girls are limited in what they can do.

With these findings in mind, the brand hired Lucy Walker of Pulse films to create a new #LikeAGirl documentary-style video to showcase the effects of emoji use on teen girls.

“As someone who has studied sociolinguistics, I know the kind of impact even seemingly innocuous language choices can have on girls," says Walker. "It was so interesting to hear these girls talk about emojis and realize how the options available to them are subtly reinforcing the societal stereotypes and limitations they face every day."